


Long Time Gone

by lori (zakhad), zakhad



Series: Captain and Counselor [50]
Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-21
Updated: 2016-05-21
Packaged: 2018-06-09 15:19:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6912631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zakhad/pseuds/lori, https://archiveofourown.org/users/zakhad/pseuds/zakhad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Deanna takes a side trip she didn't expect, to end up where she's been before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Long Time Gone

**Author's Note:**

> If you look at all the wikipedia and other posted histories of Picard, Crusher, etc. you quickly realize that the novels are all over the place as to his history between the Stargazer and the Enterprise. So I did what I usually do, take what works for me and leave the rest aside.
> 
> Of course, I have three other WIPs. But the brain took a left turn, and I decided not to risk losing the plot bunny, and followed.

How long will I love you  
As long as stars are above you  
And longer if I can

How long will I need you  
As long as the seasons need to  
Follow their plan

How long will I be with you  
As long as the sea is bound to  
Wash up on the sand

How long will I want you  
As long as you want me to  
And longer by far

How long will I hold you  
As long as your father told you  
As long as you can

How long will I give to you  
As long as I live through you  
However long you say

 

_Elle Goulding_

 

* * *

 

 

Deanna's stomach was doing the same spinning and whirling as the shuttle. "Computer!"

No answer. She fought the weird gravity of a spinning shuttle with a malfunctioning everything, and pulled herself into the chair, shoving her feet against the console and twisting to settle facing the navigation controls. She had to cling one-handed to the edge of the console and enter commands with the other. Slowly, the stars on the viewscreen settled back into stationary objects.

"Cadet?"

She turned to find the cadet had rolled to the back of the compartment and come up against the back wall, past the transporter. And as she looked around and went to check on the young man, she put together the sequence of events and came to the grim conclusion that the violent motion of the shuttle had propelled the cadet against the blunt corner of the console with sufficient force to cause a skull fracture and sufficient brain damage to kill him. The blood trails and patches told the story, as did fragments of bone visible in the open wound on the bottom of the back of his head.

She first tied her hair back -- the pins had come loose, and it was in the way -- and went about checking all the sensors, all the systems, then assessing the results. Trying to contact the ship didn't work. Trying to get the computer to respond to voice commands again was beyond her technical ability; there was a series of problems in the engines that she couldn't remedy, but she had impulse at least. She put the navigation systems up and tried to plot a course for the ship, but it was then that she noticed the positions of the stars were off -- the computer threw up conflicting information on the screen for her to survey. And that led to comparing the shuttle's internal time clock with what they were pulling from the Federation beacons that enabled subspace communications, and recognized the problem.

By the Four Deities, she loathed time travel. Absolutely, positively hated it, with the fury of a supernova.

Piecing together what happened took a while. She fought with compromised systems as well as her own technical deficits for a few hours, after finally putting the cadet in stasis in the minimal sickbay below. Fortunate that she had chosen a runabout instead of one of the smaller shuttles for Cadet Barnett's second try at shuttle piloting certification.

She could almost hear Jean-Luc's swearing at this -- she indulged in a few choice words in Klingon, herself, even picking up a piece of paneling that had come loose and flinging it uselessly to the side, having the presence of mind to angle it so it wouldn't impact anything sensitive.

She needed help. Putting in commands to bring up more information, syncing the shuttle's computer with the beacon, she found the nearest starbase and plotted a course. Then she started the slow process of getting as much done as she could to repair things -- it would keep her busy, at least, over the next month or two. That and meditating, sleeping, eating, and meditating some more, and maintaining the mental discipline it took to keep herself from the headaches and pain of being so far separated from her bondmate. It would take time travel to get home, so she hoped, fervently, that she could time it to be gone mere minutes from Jean-Luc's perspective.

Perhaps, she reflected, those time agents from the future would detect her presence here and come to fix the timeline. She was most definitely at a high risk of causing problems. She was somewhere between starbases 372 and 373, in a sector not too far from Betazed, as the _Enterprise_ had been traveling from there toward the next assignment, some diplomatic issue that had cropped up between the Klingon Empire and a migrating Beta Quadrant species that had been settled on a world not far outside Klingon borders.

Or if not the Department of Temporal Investigations, then possibly a ship bound for starbase 373 would come across the _Hawking_ while she putted along at three-quarters impulse.

 

 

* * *

 

 

"The _Hawking_ has vanished from sensors," deLio announced, in the same calm way he'd announced attacking warships, spatial anomalies about to suck them into oblivion, and hull breaches.

Jean-Luc jumped up and stared at the main viewer. "Why?" he snapped. He'd felt her absence the minute it happened, had been about to ask for a sensor sweep when his security chief had spoken. Deanna wasn't there any more -- this was unacceptable, and his thoughts went immediately to the kids. He'd have to go to them next.

"Sensors are picking up...."

He turned impatiently, arms crossed, and glared at deLio, then strode to the ops console and glared over Edison's shoulder. Edison, after so many years, barely flinched at his captain's ire which he understood well enough was not directed at him. He ran fingertips across the console and turned to say, "Sir, I'm picking up a quantum filament -- there are chronoton particles present as well as the usual complement of radiation and tachyons. I am not detecting any indication of the shuttle -- no debris. I suspect -- "

" -- time travel. Of course. What else? God, I hate time travel." Jean-Luc caught himself and turned to the helm, glancing at Dulles. "Plot a wide berth around that filament. I want a full sweep of the area, look for any sign of the shuttle and analyze the data -- see if we have a way of getting -- "

"Sir," deLio interrupted urgently.

Jean-Luc turned to the screen again -- the shuttle had appeared in front of them, and he felt immediately that all was well. Deanna felt close to him as if she were standing at his side -- the bond flared open, and he could tell she had been through something intense, something that had put her into a turmoil of fear and frustrated anger.

"I'm going to the shuttle bay -- get us on course, Mr. Dulles, warp six, once the shuttle is docked."

He arrived in the cavernous shuttle bay as she stepped out of the _Hawking_ , and he didn't like the look she gave him as she turned into a statue, staring at him as if she had just done something horrible and he might punish her for it. It didn't make him hesitate -- he came at her full speed, halting within arm's length, then hesitating to put his arms around her as he'd intended.

"Dee?" he said softly, breaking the silence.

The crease in her forehead deepened slightly. "You don't remember?"

"Oh -- " She had to mean she'd done some tampering, she had to mean he had been there, and he sent his thoughts back into memory searching for it -- but there wasn't anything there to find. He didn't remember anything other than the encounter she'd had with his much-younger, cadet self and his mother, long, long ago. "No. How far back were you?"

"You were fifty, perhaps fifty-one," she said faintly. "A little younger than I am now."

He couldn't keep himself from a grin -- looking at her, he could imagine what he'd thought then, faced with a lovely woman who clearly exercised a lot and had the curves he would have noticed at once. Not to mention she was out of uniform, which made sense, as she would get too much attention wearing the current uniform style, while wandering around more than thirty years in the past. She wore a plain, simple dress in a deep pink that suited her. Her hair looked different -- she had it up, but the braids were dangling in long loops from the back of her head. But it didn't help. He remember nothing -- at that age, he had been involved with one or two different women, had met a great many people, but no one who had looked as she did now. Like herself, out of uniform.

"Are you going to share what happened, since it won't do any damage now?"

She sighed heavily, drawing his eyes to her chest, to watch. Immediately she frowned at him and crossed her arms. "You had all of five minutes to miss me -- honestly, you'd think I was gone for months."

"Were you?"

Deanna covered her face with her hands. And so he stepped forward a few inches and put his arms around her, and she slid her arms around his ribs, and pressed her face into his jacket.

"You're not going to like this, Jean. You're going to shout at me. But I honestly couldn't stand it another day."

"Well, I doubt that," he murmured. But it led to her tensing -- he felt her go rigid from head to toe against him. "What did you do? Deanna?"

"I tried so hard," she whispered, stepping back, and he reached to touch her face, wiping tears away with his thumb. "You told me before that you've changed a lot. I thought I understood that. I was wrong."

He tried to set aside rising anger, because it really was quite pointless, being angry at his younger self for whatever he must have done and couldn't remember doing. "Where were you?"

"Starbase 373. You were on your way to an archaeological expedition, after your court-martial -- you weren't in Starfleet," she said softly, looking at the floor. "And I didn't look like...."

And then it hit him. "Anna," he exclaimed, and dismay filled him. No wonder he hadn't remembered right away.

Deanna raised her gaze to meet his, startled, sensing what he was experiencing, her head tilting to the right as the angst glimmered in her dark, woe-filled eyes.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered, pulling her against him once more.

 

* * *

 

 

A single tone from the computer woke her, and she sat up in the bunk and reached for the nearest panel. The male voice that spilled into the room, breaking the five days of silence, was so welcome -- she could sense now an entire ship full of people, and smiled happily. A Starfleet vessel.

"This is Captain Reynolds, of the USS _Maldives_ \-- may we be of assistance? Your vessel looks damaged."

"Yes, please, this is -- " she hesitated. She didn't remember anyone she'd ever known being aboard the _Maldives_ but it wasn't enough of a reassurance. "Captain, I'm afraid I have to invoke the Temporal Prime Directive for now, and explain in person. I'm a Starfleet officer in distress, after an entanglement with a spatial phenomenon that sent me into the past."

"Understood. We'll be careful."

She went forward, piloted the shuttle into the shuttle bay of an _Excelsior_ class vessel and then locked down the computer with a password. When she stepped out of the _Hawking_ the captain and his first officer were standing there, in a uniform she hadn't seen since shortly after her graduation from the Academy. That confirmed what she already knew, she was wholly unlikely to run into herself, at least. Her younger self was at the Academy. Possibly having dinner with a gawky cadet named Jon, come to think of it.

She absolutely hated time travel. 

"Captain," she said, extending a hand. "I'm Commander Troi."

"Captain Reynolds," the black-haired, middle-aged man said, smiling and inclining his head toward the younger blond man on his left. "And this is Commander Torgeson. I suppose you're unable to say much about what's brought you here?"

"And it's not going to be possible for any of your crew to work on my shuttle," she replied. "I was out with a cadet, who was trying for his certification when we struck a quantum filament -- we're lucky the shuttle didn't come apart. Evidently something happened that sent me back in time, and the cadet is dead -- I have him in stasis. I need to find a way to get back to where I should be. When, rather. Thirty years in the future, give or take."

Both of them lost their smile, and Torgeson looked at his captain, clearly at a loss. "I can't say I've had a lot of experience with time travel, or quantum filaments," Reynolds said at last. "The computer can help, I hope."

"Or you can take me to starbase 373, and perhaps I will be able to find a temporal physicist to consult. Starfleet Command has protocols for this, I believe."

Reynolds looked dubious. "Maybe they do in the future. We might have to make it up as we go along. But, regardless, we'll do what we can. Is there a record for you currently? Guessing your younger self is somewhere."

"I was stationed on a small science vessel as an ensign. Captain, it's extremely likely that I will know officers that I may encounter along the way, so I need to keep a very low profile. In fact, I think I need to alter my appearance significantly before setting foot on a starbase. By the time I am first officer of -- my vessel, I will have served with thousands of people. And to get back I will have to be here for a while, and it's far too much risk to have casual contact with people as I am."

"All right, sounds like we have a lot to discuss. Let's head for my ready room -- George, you have the bridge while I'm helping the commander sort through this situation. You can trust me to keep the details to myself, right?"

"I'll have to trust someone for the next thirty years," Deanna said. "Because there are a lot of reasons that I have to get back -- some of them have to do with the future of the Federation. Which isn't hubris. The Department of Temporal Investigations have made that point to me before." She thought about Yves, the child that he was, and the adult version who'd hinted at them twice that they would be instrumental in the Federation in very important ways. And she thought about her husband, who would certainly give up Starfleet and take the children home, if she didn't come back -- and how his loss would be a blow to Starfleet, well before he finished tasks Yves had informed them he would complete.

She followed them from the shuttle bay, continuing the long contemplation of what she needed to do, to avoid causing a disruption in the timeline. She'd had several days to sort it out, and now that she had a fully-functional computer to help her continue, she was optimistic.

"Sickbay," the captain said as the lift door closed. He glanced at her almost apologetically. "You know we have to verify what you're saying."

"Oh, yes," she said. "Exactly what I would do, were our positions reversed." She smiled at the captain. "You have every right to be wary. Starfleet is that strange, sometimes."

The smirk on both officers told her they understood completely.

They walked into sickbay, and as the three officers present converged on them, recognition struck her like a punch to the gut. The female doctor in front of her stopped in her tracks, at the smile Deanna was giving her -- Deanna was sure she confused the hell out of the younger woman, being nearly in tears.

"I'm sorry," she exclaimed, angrily wiping her fingers under her eyes. "Hello, Dr. Crusher."

"Do I know you?"

"Oh, not really, not at all. Maybe someday," Deanna said firmly, looking at the captain with hopefully enough ire that he understood.

Reynolds was, happily, not a dullard. "Doctor, the commander is on a classified mission -- we're transporting her to a starbase. While she's aboard I need you to complete a physical and give me the results verbally, without logging anything in the computer. I need to you scan for any indication that she is from the future."

The confusion Beverly felt was plain, but she nodded and gestured at a biobed. "Commander, if you would."

As she lay back and let the doctor begin, Deanna closed her eyes and tried not to feel so overwhelmed. Not to think of Jean-Luc, where he must be -- this was after Jack's death, after the court-martial following the loss of the _Stargazer_ , and somewhere aboard a little boy named Wesley was probably in school.

"What's your name?"

Deanna opened her eyes to find Beverly's friendly blue eyes above her. It took a moment -- she blurted, "Anna."

"Well, I know I can't know anything about anything, but it'll be all right, Anna," she said warmly, raising her eyes to the panel over Deanna's head as she reached for it. "You look as though you're about to hear bad news -- I'm sure you might, some day, but you're fine at the moment. Right?"

"Yes."

 

* * *

 

 

Deanna guided her shuttle into the large bay of starbase 373, parked in the designated spot, shut everything down after adding another password and locking out all functions to anyone but herself. Reynolds had been sufficiently satisfied by the doctor's report to take her almost all the way to the starbase -- at warp, of course, it took mere hours instead of the months she'd been facing -- then letting her go the last parsec at impulse.

She'd replicated clothes, all civilian, and packed a small bag. She'd look like a tourist to anyone and everyone, and she headed for the Starfleet offices at once, hoping she had no clue who the starbase commander was. She had even thought about not involving him at all -- but Geordi at this point in his career would be unable to help her, and she had no idea who else to contact. She'd checked on Data, who was in service already on a vessel far enough away that she knew any attempt to solicit his help would be a disruption of the timeline.

Making her way through the starbase generated more than the usual amount of attention she would get, when abroad in environments where no one knew her. Something to do with her hair, she thought. Dr. Crusher had complied with her request and created a new appearance for her -- this version of herself was blessed with pale blond hair, a less prominent nose and more pointed chin, slightly lighter skin, and with the help of some soft, permeable long-term implants, wide blue eyes. She was amazed by the technology, despite it having been available commercially for a long time; the eye implants actually had a tiny chip and sensor that would widen and close the pupil in response to varying light levels.

She was in a junction of corridors when she heard his voice. Just his laughter, actually, but it rose above the general clamor of many pedestrians talking and walking, and she realized that the ache of missing him that she was actively fighting for so long had dwindled significantly. While she stood fighting the impulse to look for him, the other pedestrians walked around her in both directions. 

But she forced her feet to move, and walked away from the bar, the stores, the restaurant, forced herself to not reach out for him mentally, forced herself to leave behind the earlier version of the husband to whom she was so very attached that her eyes hurt for wanting to cry that he wasn't there. 

These challenging situations were always so much easier when Captain Picard was there.

 

* * *

 

 

"Thank you, Commander," she said, smiling at Commander Vadim. 

The dark-skinned man returned the smile, and nodded. "I'll give you quarters -- no need for you to be resorting to the hotel, if we have a billet for you. Deck thirty, section ten, cabin C. If they aren't to your liking just let me know."

"I'm sure it will be fine," she said. "I don't need too much, to wait for a response and do research. I'm going to keep a very low profile while I'm here -- I already nearly ran into someone I meet in the future, and narrowly avoided him."

"We'll do the best we can for you, Commander. And I'll have them contact you the minute Dr. Blessing responds to your request."

Deanna left the commander's office, went through ops smiling blandly at the officers there, and headed for her assigned cabin. Once on deck thirty she recognized that he had given her a suite in the quarters reserved for diplomatic corps, for ambassadors traveling abroad -- very nice accommodations indeed.

She dropped her bag on the sofa and went to the broad viewports, looking out at the stars. A commercial star liner drifted slowly by. Kicking off her heels, she reached over her shoulder to unfasten her dress at the collar and then pull it off over her head. Leaving it draped on a chair, she told the computer to fill the bathtub and headed in to indulge herself.

Of course, pleasant as a hot bath could be, all of it only reminded her of her husband, her children, and how evenings at home were -- filled with the noise of family and after the children went to bed, with the company of her best friend, who would be happy to rub her aching feet and quietly beat her at chess. Or any of the other things she enjoyed with him. 

As she dressed again and thought about dinner, perhaps in a restaurant since she would be able to dodge the younger Captain Picard easily, now that she knew he was there  -- it was nearly time, and she'd skipped lunch so was quite famished -- a motion outside caught her attention. A small Starfleet vessel approached. More opportunities to muck up the timeline, she thought grimly.

She turned to head for the replicator. 

 

* * *

 

 

After five days of living in her quarters without seeing another soul, Deanna finally decided she'd had enough.

She researched every day, trying to find instances where a quantum filament had caused unplanned time travel, or to find combinations of phenomena that might cause it when combined with a filament. She researched time travel methods in general hoping for something that she could accomplish in a runabout, without the aid of a starship. By the middle of the third day, her head felt as though it might burst. And then she exercised as much as she could, even asking the computer if anyone was around in her section of deck thirty and running the corridors at full speed.

But being alone, after years of being surrounded by friendly people she knew, had been harder than she'd expected. So the afternoon of her fifth day on the station, she abandoned the suite and headed for the stores. Shopping was mindless, and people-watching could be entertaining without requiring interaction that might lead to temporal issues.

She spent a few hours in shops trying on clothing and finding some small entertainment in contemplating the possible origins of items in gift shops. Having so many people in close proximity helped a little -- the loneliness of not having her bond mate present had begun to feel sharper and she had been less able to cope as time passed. She sensed, at one point, that Jean-Luc was not far from her, likely going from one part of the station to another -- she was sniffing some perfume and purposefully moved to the back of the store. 

Three stores and a cafe later, she decided it was time for a late lunch, and carried her small bag of minor purchases toward a Risan restaurant she'd decided to try. She settled at one of the small two-person booths along the left wall and ordered some cold tea, and was perusing the menu when she sensed him again. He was coming closer, she thought, and worked hard not to look up, not turn around, and tried to completely ignore him. She thought about what she was wearing -- a short-skirted teal outfit with metallic embellishments on the shoulder straps -- and wished she had chosen something ankle-length, with a high neck instead of a plunging neckline.

What the hell was he even doing here for so long? She tried to remember what he'd said about this part of his life. Very little, actually, beyond the affair with Louvois, the female attorney who had prosecuted during the court-martial in which he had been exonerated of any wrong-doing in the loss of the _Stargazer_. She knew he'd indulged for a while in his archaeological penchant and returned to Starfleet. He hadn't said much about that, either. And of course, there was nothing in his service record about any of it -- just a line noting the gap in service.

"Are you ready, miss?" 

She looked up at the waiter, gave him the order -- she tossed off the name of a dish she remembered, having not been able to read a word of the menu, and turned back to sip tea intently, determined to ignore the hell out of the man who had settled at the opposite side of the room. She reached in the bag and used a manicured nail to pick at the tag on a bracelet -- a pointless thing to get, but she liked it, and it went with the dress she was wearing. As she slipped it on her right wrist she noticed movement out of the corner of her eye.

"Excuse me," said Jean-Luc Picard, just inches from her. 

She affected boredom, as she looked up over the rim of her glass. "Yes?" she asked, sipping.

He had a little sparse hair left, on his mostly-bald head. Otherwise he was very much the same man she knew. Dressed in plain tight-fitting gray pants, a white shirt, a gray jacket -- no jewelry. He smiled -- how miserable, to be unable to respond to that smile. 

"I noticed you were dining alone as well -- would you like some company?"

She pursed her lips, trying hard to disapprove. Pitching her voice slightly higher than normal, she said, "What kind of company are you suggesting?"

The smile faded a bit. "The friendly kind, of course."

Deanna tried to summon anger, or annoyance, and all that would come was sadness, longing. She stared across at the empty bench seat. "I suppose I could use a friend."

He dropped into the seat, smiled across the table, and said, "I'm Jean-Luc Picard."

"Anna Benning," she replied in her new voice, hoping she could be forgiven for co-opting her paternal family name. "I am traveling, to Risa."

"I'm supposed to be on my way to Malthusia, to participate in an archaeological project there. But my transport has been delayed elsewhere. Are you on vacation, then?"

"In a way."

He looked at her now with sympathy, and she realized she was letting her tone reflect her actual mood. Perhaps that would be best. She knew he was very likely to detect falsehood. Stalling with another sip of tea, she let the sadness tinge her smile.

"I was supposed to meet my fiancé," she said, looking down at the mint leaf floating in the melting ice chunks in her glass. "As it turns out, he decided his promotion and new posting were more important than our wedding. So I am going to Risa, anyway, and he is no doubt enjoying half a pip more than he had before, and replicated food."

It was a story he would hear again, from her after she became his ship's counselor, but no doubt a common one in general. Jean-Luc's smile twisted -- how like him, to be angry a little on a stranger's behalf. Chivalry from start to finish, with him. "It'll wear off, and he'll regret it, I'm sure."

She snorted and placed her near-empty glass on the edge of the table, to get the waiter's attention for a refill. "If you will forgive me for saying so, men are often capable of making whatever promises they need to get what they want and then breaking them without turning a hair. My mother warned me, and much to my frustration, she was correct."

"I'm sorry," he said, quite sincerely. 

"Well. It's no good, really, to attempt making friends with a broken heart. It does not put one's best face forward, does it? I'm surprised you're still here, not running from the sob story of the woman who's likely to do you no favors, in the mood she's in."

He brought both arms up and propped his elbows on the table, and looked at the pathetic four daisies in a vase near the wall. The emotions he was experiencing resonated with her -- the broken hearted state she claimed was true, she missed her husband, and he too had clearly experienced something similar recently. Betrayal, she remembered, now that she thought about the details of the court-martial. He'd taken up with Philippa before learning she was the prosecution, and she'd used something he'd told her in bed against him in court. 

"Mr. Picard?" She decided to start hesitating before speaking -- she'd forgotten to pitch her voice upwards. This was too much like being undercover, which she hated nearly as much as time travel.

He brought his eyes back to hers. "Sorry. It seems we're in the same boat, as it were."

"I'm not going to play confessor, and I don't expect you to. Not in the mood," she said. 

The corner of his mouth twitched. "Fair enough. We could talk about what you do when you're not traveling to Risa."

"I used to be a Starfleet officer." She left off the rest of the sentence, that now she spent her hours exercising and researching in a private suite on a starbase, trying to return to thirty years in the future so she could continue to be one.

His eyebrows flitted upward briefly. "I was, as well. I've been trying to decide if I want to go back to it."

"Well, certainly, you should," she said, watching the waiter refill her tea with a pitcher. Another waiter brought her food, and his -- they had ordered the same thing. After the waiters left, she smirked at her plate. 

"Why should I?" He started to gather food on his fork. The pasta was absolutely littered with chunks of crunchy vegetables, and it took effort to get them on the tines.

"You're Captain Picard, of course," she said offhandedly as if she talked about him all the time.

Now he was staring at her with a little suspicion, and some frustration. 

"You said you were in Starfleet. I don't think there can be very many Picards enlisted, can there? Anyway, you have to be good, to reach captain -- certainly better than I was." It was true -- she had, for a long time, doubted she would ever do more than counseling. Easy to channel that part of herself again. "Better than Bill, or my silly cousin who thinks she's going to make it through the Academy without breaking a nail."

She was deliberately trying for dismissive, trying to build herself up as having antipathy for Starfleet while nudging him back into it. She knew she had to be careful, he had a good instinct, for reading people. If she wasn't careful he would start to treat her like a puzzle. He was too interested. Why had she let him sit down?

He smiled again, faintly. "Why did you leave Starfleet?"

"It didn't really suit me, you know? I mean, you go through the Academy, they make you do all these impossible things, and you go find a posting you think you'll like, and then you spend your day inspecting things, or repairing things, or standing guard, and you follow orders -- and maybe you work at that for a few years and get a promotion. And you start all over again, for another one, and maybe you start getting to go on away missions. Might even get to talk to the captain once or twice, if you're lucky." She shrugged and put a wad of pasta in her mouth.

"So why did you join?"

Deanna let the pasta be thoroughly chewed, while she thought about it, and swallowed. She took another sip of tea to get another few seconds. "I guess I didn't know what else to do."

His expression, as he took a bite of his own meal, told her she was in trouble. He was now adding things up in that typical Picard fashion, and his instinct was telling him that she might be lying. Rather than let him get to the questions where he would pick apart and dig until she caved in, she continued, stringing together truths and half-truths, filling in around the edges with confabulation.

"My father was in it," she said. "And my mother and I -- we're like competitors, more than mother and daughter. She really likes younger men. And I just don't care to spend my life in one place. I thought...." Deanna smiled again, at the mint leaf as she raised her glass. "Dad died, when I was young. He told me about his adventures. I guess it makes sense that he didn't tell me about the tedious things, or the risks. Now that Bill left me in the lurch I suppose I should reconsider. Maybe they need someone in operations here -- starbases need people, too." And now she kicked herself for returning to something more like herself -- she should have tossed out becoming a hairdresser as an option.

"It sounds like we're both jaded," Jean-Luc said. Sympathy had returned to his eyes. "Tired of it all. But there are adventures to be had outside Starfleet, you know?"

"You mean like -- what did you say? Geology?"

"Archaeology. It's like a puzzle, a mystery, waiting to be put together. I became interested in it while at the Academy, and I've always thought I'd like to focus more on it, someday. It seemed to me this might be the time."

"Doesn't it involve digging? That doesn't sound like much of an adventure to me," she said, gathering another forkful of food.

"You never know until you try," he replied, smirking, daring her to do it.

She fell silent. They ate together for another twenty minutes or so without speaking, and she would glance at him, and almost catch him looking at her. He wasn't losing interest -- he was thinking, and not uncomfortable with the silence. The waiter returned and refilled glasses again.

"How long will you be on the starbase?" he asked finally, as he finished his meal. 

"I think the next transport that will get me to Risa is in another day or so. I'd have to look at my schedule."

"My friends will be here next week. Perhaps we could keep each other company, until you leave."

Deanna almost sighed, barely refrained from it, and reached for her glass. When the waiter brought the dessert menu she deliberately chose a small dish of vanilla ice cream, determined not to reveal her chocolate habit or anything else that would remind him of Anna later. 

"Would you like to head down to the bar, after dessert?" he asked. 

He had a rather different mixture of emotion than she expected. He hoped, and held himself under rigid control, and felt quite a lot more tension than she would have anticipated. There was no indication that he suspected anything, but the shifting anxiety and attraction concerned her. It reminded her eerily of how he'd felt when he'd approached her in Ten Forward, and they had taken the first steps toward marriage, children, and a relationship she had never imagined possible. It took her a moment to set aside the urge to cry.

"I hoped to turn in early, actually," she said. "I haven't been sleeping well. It leaves me rather tired all the time -- heartbreak is so tediously exhausting, isn't it?"

He looked her in the eye, and while the hope started to fade, he tried again. "Then perhaps an hour on the observation deck, a little quiet contemplation of the stars?"

She couldn't help herself -- her lips twitched into a smile, such an automatic one that her husband elicited nearly every day. A fond, warm little smile that she saw mirrored on Jean-Luc even as she realized it was happening. Damn him.

"You are a lovely, lovely man," she murmured. "But I must say no, because I'm afraid I would rather quickly become attached to you, and it's not in my best interests at all. Why would I allow myself to do such a thing, just after I proved how horrible my judgment can be? And I already know you won't be following me anywhere, any more than I have any interest in archaeology."

The startled guffaw from him was a bad sign. He shook his head, grinning, and took the check from the waiter. "You stay here, I'll be right back."

But the minute he was walking away to pay the bill, she reached down, slipped her sandals off, then left the restaurant at a rapid walk, turning the corner and hurrying away down the corridor until she reached one of the clothing stores. She darted in and hid behind a rack of large, multi-layered, gauzy outfits; when the lady started her way she shook her head, waved her off, winked at her, and peered around the clothing rack. The sales clerk nodded and went off to the other end of the store.

She waited until she sensed him moving off, frustrated but still intrigued and feeling as he had been. Perhaps not the last time she would see him, but she would try to avoid him, at least. After he was well away she left the store with a smile and wave to the clerk and went straight across to the nearest lift, got in, and rode to deck thirty.

Her quarters felt so empty. She dropped sandals and bag on a chair, strode over to the viewport, stared at the small collection of vessels -- another Starfleet ship had arrived, as well as a couple of passenger ships -- and she thought about her limited options. Leaving would mean explaining the situation to yet another Starfleet captain, who may or may not believe her, leading to another sickbay visit, leading to another doctor whom she might know. The physicist she had sent a message to, along with the sensor readings she'd collected on the quantum filament shortly after her arrival in the past, had yet to respond.

Deanna moaned, wishing she could hear her children's laughter, her husband's voice, and her heart ached in her chest. She turned to head for the bedroom, to meditate -- something that she was finding difficult, but desperately needed to do.

 

* * *

 

 

She hid in her quarters as long as she could tolerate it -- five long, moping, angry, crying, frustrating, wailing-at-the-walls days, of trying to focus and research and request more from Memory Alpha, and she thought she might tear her hair out. She'd finally stopped being startled by her reflection. The red-eyed blond in the mirror wasn't a stranger any longer.

In some of her better moments she contacted Vadim and had a short talk with him, confiding her frustrations in a general way, getting an apologetic update that Dr. Blessing remained mysteriously silent. That morning, Vadim had taken the liberty of contacting an admiral on her behalf -- she had a brief panic attack until he reassured her by mentioning the name, and it was an admiral she didn't know. He was awaiting further advice from the admiral, possibly a name of another scientist familiar with stellar and temporal phenomena.

It was enough to send her research in a different direction. Now she requested from the computer anything that might help her find another physicist. An hour later she threw another glass, at the same place. She plexed, calmed herself, thought about and ached for her children, to be held in her husband's arms again, and went to replicate a broom. She swept up the pieces of the last few glasses she had thrown and recycled everything. The wall next to the replicator looked none the worse for wear.

Finally, on day six, she decided to try to go out again. But first, she searched, reaching out as she hadn't done in a while -- the man who would be her husband should be gone now, and she didn't want to see him again. She'd been blocking out everything as much as possible to focus on her search for answers. When she sensed him again, distantly, she roared a few choice words in Romulan and pitched the vase that benignly sat on the end table.

What was he doing?

Frustrated, she flung herself down on the couch and glared at the ceiling.

Her stomach eventually started to mumble, and when she asked the time, the computer pleasantly informed her it was nearly eighteen thirty. Rising, she went in for a shower, did her hair, put on a modest dress of silky green shot through with gold threads, applied judicious makeup to cover the dark areas beneath her eyes, put on lipstick, and went out the door.

Her empathy told her he was across the station somewhere, and after a ten minute wait while she window shopped here and there, he still was. So she entered the Chinese restaurant, and ordered a combination plate complete with fortune cookie. She enjoyed the crowd, the voices of a few children happily babbling about the fortunes in their cookies and the amusement of the parents keeping her entertained and distracted.

She was about to break open her own cookie when she sensed Jean-Luc approaching. At once, she was on her feet, heading for the proprietor, instructing him to charge the meal to her quarters and already searching for an alternate exit. The ladies room was the only option other than the front door. She headed for it.

There were only so many reasons to stay in a restroom. She exhausted all of them, and stood waiting, but he was still close. As if waiting for her, she thought. Sighing, she checked herself in the mirror one last time and left. There he was, standing just outside the entrance of Fong's Chinese Cuisine. He must have seen her.

The reproach in his eyes almost made her feel like an ensign all over again. She laughed at it, catching him off guard. "You should be in Starfleet, you make me feel like I've just been written up."

"I should write you up," he said sternly, but softened it with a smile. "Why didn't you stay?"

"Why are you still on this starbase? You said your friends were supposed to be here. Or your transport, or whatever it is you expect to carry you off to dig around in mud looking for the pieces to your puzzle."

His hands went to his hips, and he stood there contemplating her with a bemused sort of expression that didn't really express all the conflicting feelings, the hesitating, wary way he felt but that wasn't enough to keep him from giving in to how drawn to her he'd become. This was different than before, she thought. Had he stayed here to find her? Her heart gave an odd sideways lurch at the thought. She never should have spoken to him in the first place. This was wrong.

Jean-Luc took a step toward her. "They're not coming."

She shrugged, turned to walk away. "I'm sorry to hear it. Sounded like you wanted to go."

But he was beside her in an instant, walking with her, and she sensed the determination. "I don't have to go anywhere, any more."

"I suppose not."

"Why are you still here?" he asked, each word a shot fired. Accusing.

"I don't have to be anywhere, either. I went, I came back. I'll go somewhere else in a few days."

He walked with her for a few minutes, past the men's clothing shop. "Why are you lying about that?" he asked.

Deanna didn't want to have him follow her all the way back to deck thirty, so she stopped in front of the Risan exotic sex toy store, glancing up at the glyphs, wondering if he knew what they said. She turned to face him at last. "Why are you accusing me of lying?"

"You didn't go to Risa. There've been no transports headed that way, not for the past two weeks."

"Maybe I want to keep my business to myself."

He leaned, and somehow she didn't anticipate it but he grabbed her chin and kissed her aggressively -- it was the last thing she had thought he would ever do, to a woman he hardly knew. For a moment she was caught up in it -- it was after all Jean-Luc, and the kiss was familiar enough. But her shoulders bumping against the store front jarred her back to reality, and she braced herself and shoved him away. And her next reflex was to run, and so she did, forgetting that she was in a pair of sandals and a skirt, running as though she were in sweats and racing cadets around a track.

The main corridor was wide enough and sparsely-occupied at the moment, so weaving through pedestrians while running at full stride was easily done. She could tell he was after her. She ran on, drawing farther away from him, until she found the opportunity she'd waited for and grabbed a railing, losing most of her forward momentum as she swung around the corner, found her footing, and hammered down the wide steps that accessed the next deck below, also more stores and restaurants. At the bottom of the steps she did an about face and hurried back alongside the stairwell into the shadows, found an access door, slipped inside and closed it behind her.

It was a janitorial closet. There was a large floor cleaner in the middle of the space, and a few sonic tools hung on the wall. The space was dimly lit by a single lamp in the corner over the door. She took deep, slow breaths, as quietly as she could. She sensed him overhead, frustrated and out of breath, and smiled.

When he'd passed farther from her in a direction that suggested he hadn't followed her down the steps, she left the closet and checked herself over, smoothing her dress, and walked casually out to join the clusters of pedestrians. At the first lift she came to, she went back to deck thirty.

 

* * *

 

"I've forwarded what I could," Dr. Blessing said from the small screen. "I'm sorry that I could not be more help. It's a very unusual request. I don't believe I've ever heard of anything like this."

"Thank you, Dr. Blessing."

The man looked at her with obvious sympathy. "I can't imagine being in your position. How alone you must be."

"It's been difficult. But I expect to find a way back. I have to."

Blessing smiled, but didn't look convinced. "Good luck."

She turned from the screen as it went dark, and closed her eyes, trying not to cry again. She'd cried entirely too much. This was day fifteen, and while she'd successfully avoided contact with Jean-Luc, he was still there on the station. It was getting harder -- part of her wanted to give in, to be with him, to not even care about the future any more. The rational part of her said that was wrong. Madness -- she would never have the children she'd had, they wouldn't exist, and it was unthinkable. And he wouldn't be the same either. Nothing would be the same.

With a will she brought up what the physicist had sent her, and started to read.

Deanna jumped half out of her chair when the annunciator went off. No one had bothered her, here, and the only people who should know she was living here were the officers on the base, all sworn to secrecy. She unraveled her shields and wanted to shriek -- how had he found her?

Crossing the room to the door, she steeled herself to do whatever it took to drive him away -- it was impossible to pretend he was anyone but himself, and rejecting him appeared to be impossible for her to do. Her heart wouldn't let her say the words. But she had to. When the door opened, he stood looking at her, surprised. Foolish, she chided -- she should have pretended to not be home. Locked the door.

Immediately, his hand went to keep the door from sliding back out. He leaned against the wall and smiled. "I'm sorry," he said. "I shouldn't have been so -- pushy."

"Please go," she whispered.

He stared in dismay and it was so hard for her not to reach for him. "How is it that -- I can't be the only one, who feels -- "

She wanted to scream in frustration -- the anger gave her enough emotional energy to be convincing, she hoped. "My feelings," she blurted, her voice laden with woe and unshed tears. "You don't know me, you invite yourself over to my table and spend half an hour with me, you hardly know anything about me! You want me to go through it all again. It's what Bill did -- I met him one day at a restaurant on Betazed, and he swept me off my feet. I let him do that. Oh, it's true, I chose to leave Starfleet, because we both agreed it wasn't possible to serve in the same chain of command, but we knew we didn't want a subspace relationship. We knew we wanted kids. We knew so much, and we knew we would be married. Until he decided it wasn't true, and you know, he was so very sorry, so very apologetic, in his message. So sympathetic when he kicked me out of his life just as abruptly as he walked into it."

She stalked away from the door, waving her hands for emphasis, as she spoke. She paused, glanced at him -- he was watching her with trepidation. "You think it's nothing," she exclaimed. "Just a fling. It doesn't have to mean anything. Maybe I'm a great target because you know I'm on the rebound. Maybe you told me you were, too, so it was understood that's all it would be. Some people can be that way. One thing I've learned about myself -- I can't. I have to stop myself, with people like you, because I get lost and if the person I'm with isn't being careful with me, if they treat me like it's no big deal, I get hurt."

Deanna had to turn away, stop looking at him, because his sympathy was too much to bear. She tried to calm down her breathing, to relax so the sob wouldn't escape.

"I know you're feeling -- "

"You don't know how I'm feeling!" she shouted. It would be a mistake to let him keep talking. If she had to resort to hysteria to convince him she was unsuitable, so be it. "I'm lost! I'm not what I was, before. I'm not sure who I want to be. All I know is that I can't lose myself in you, or anyone else, again. I have to find myself, as ridiculously trite as it sounds, before I can begin to be with anyone else. I went into Starfleet knowing what I was and who I was, and I let myself turn into something I am not, and now -- "

Tapping into the fear and anger for this performance was another mistake -- she fell to her knees. Hugging herself, she started to sob. She flinched bodily when he touched her shoulder; he'd come to kneel next to her and was trying to put an arm around her.

"Let me help you," he said softly.

It was the same -- the same voice, the same concern, not backed by the love she needed but it was one of the things she had always appreciated about him, that he could have such concern for others. And beyond it, he had started to be oriented on her as he had with any woman he had loved -- something she should never have allowed.

 She laughed, horrible, angry, angst-filled sounds that she wrenched from herself in desperation. "You can't help someone like me, Jean-Luc," she said, mocking. "All that Starfleet training won't tell you how to fix a broken heart. I'm here because I need to be alone, and you're in my way. Can you let me help myself? It's what I really need."

He sat there for a bit, his hand resting on her back between her shoulder blades. "Perhaps you're right," he said at last, faintly, as though to himself.

Deanna caught herself before the urge to comfort, console, draw him in, help him, could sabotage the moment. She hunched over and leaned away from him, a sob working its way out. Let him think it was because she was so upset that he was there. Let him never know it was because she wanted, so much, and held to her determination to find him in the future. Let him be, she chanted silently to herself. Let him leave.

"I wouldn't have been happy with Bill," she said. Sadness welled up, and she shoved away thoughts of her children, and focused on the persona and her history. "I gave up too much of me for him. And I think that I need something -- someone else. Not someone who talks me into compromises that move me away from what I know in my soul that I need to be. It isn't you I'm rejecting, honestly. I have to know who I am before I can find the right person. I don't know if that's you. But I know that I can't be happy with anyone, until I get it straight in my own head, my heart, what I have to be to be happy with myself. And I know that something temporary when I am still in pain from losing what I thought was permanent would only make it worse -- because I've done that before," she added, shocked at herself for doing it.

He slid his hand over to pull her against him, briefly, and she inhaled -- calming herself, as she sensed his resignation at last to what she was pushing him to do.

"Thank you," he murmured. "I think... I might follow your example. Because it hasn't been working, as I've been. I'm sorry to have upset you -- there was something about you, something I can't really put words to, that was different, and I went to arrange transportation several times and I just -- it was too difficult to leave, and I kept thinking about you. Something about being with you feels...."

Deanna felt as though she might be suffocating, trying not to say anything, trying to block him out -- at this point it was obvious that she had been unconsciously reaching out to him as if he were her bondmate, and it was having an impact. "It's just a feeling," she whispered. "I'm sorry."

He stood up slowly and headed for the door, reluctant. She dared to look at him -- their eyes met for a long charged moment.

"I won't hear from you again, will I?" he asked at length, sounding like the thought was too depressing to put into words.

She thwarted the smile, forcing her lips straight again. "Not for a while, anyway. Perhaps... I will ask you for a tour of your ship, someday, when you are a captain again."

Jean-Luc Picard smiled -- she felt her chest tighten at the sight, and more tears started to force their way into her eyelashes. He turned and walked out of her quarters.

Deanna waited until she sensed him moving quickly away from her, likely in a turbolift, and let herself collapse to the floor, curling in a fetal position. She gave in to gut-wrenching sobs, of the kind she hadn't experienced since the day Will Riker had sent her his brief farewell message.

 

* * *

 

 

Deanna closed the book she'd read to Cordelia, and set it aside so she could lean to kiss her daughter's cheek. She checked in on Jean-Pierre, asleep as well, and then Amy and Yves, before moving through the living room and into the bedroom. She took off her hair band and ran her fingers through her hair as she entered the bathroom. The reflection in the mirror startled her -- but it was her reflection, and she contemplated it soberly. Her nose, her chin, the long dark ringlets, spilling down the front of her white robe.

When he came in, she waited for him to join her, and smiled at his reflection. He put a hand on her shoulder. "Are you all right?"

"I am now. I wasn't, for a few weeks. It actually feels a little strange being back. I thought I might not be able to get back at all, for a while."

"How did you?"

She sighed, took his arm, and went with him into the bedroom, where she sat on her side of the bed and watched him start to take off the uniform. They hadn't talked about it at all; he had, she knew, been waiting for her to calm down, spend time with the children, readjust, and was willing to wait as long as that took. When he pulled off the shirt she smiled -- he caught her doing it as he turned to drop it on the back of a chair, and returned the smile.

"Well, I spent nearly all my waking hours researching. I sent a message to Dr. Blessing, a physicist, and he was unable to do anything for me, really. After you left me alone, finally, I worked for another few days and exhausted what I could acquire from Starfleet and the Federation in general, and gave up. I lay in bed thinking about all the time I would have to spend waiting for you to accept the _Enterprise_ and get to the point where the shuttle disappeared, so I could drop back into the timeline -- we'd have been the same age by then," she said, and he frowned. "Oh, I know, not acceptable. I came to that conclusion as well. So I tried a different tactic."

"Which was?"

"I got in the runabout, used patterns for the parts I needed in the station's replicator to get what I needed to repair the engines, spent several days using a manual and schematics to take apart the warp manifold and one of the EPS conduits until the engines worked again. I took off, traveled back to approximately the coordinates I was in when I came back in time, and started to compose a long letter to the fleet admiral informing Starfleet of all the events that would be taking place -- the Dominion War, the Borg, all kinds of things. Treaties, skirmishes, anything I could remember. And just as I was about to send it, a shining vessel appeared from out of the future and stopped me, tractored me into their shuttle bay, reversed the cosmetic alterations to my face, and dropped me off in the correct time. I realized that as long as I wasn't threatening the future I wouldn't be any concern to the Department of Temporal Investigations."

He grinned as he came to sit next to her, taking her hand. "Marvelous."

"I should apologize to you, Jean-Luc," she said softly.

All trace of amusement vanished. "Whatever for?"

"Anna should," she corrected. "I think that rejecting you the way I did was the hardest thing I've ever done. I was so tempted to just give in, it really didn't look like I would find any way back to the right time. But I knew from the way you were being so aggressive with me that it wasn't the right timing, for you. I would have been just another old flame."

He had a faint smile and a faraway look in his eyes that said he was thinking about it. "Perhaps. Has it not occurred to you that it's strange, that I've never said a word about her to you?"

"Why would it? You had three encounters with her, nothing significant happened, and she mocked you and sent you away."

He fell into a state of deep thought, ruminating about something. She waited patiently.

"I used to think about Anna, trying to understand what it was about her," he said at last. "I arrived at the station full of excitement -- I was going to finally be able to spend months, if not years, fully involving myself in an archaeological effort that would be significant. And then I saw you walking through the station, when I was in a bar. I was laughing at something my companion said, and turned, and there you were. When I saw you in the restaurant I tried to catch your eye, but had to resort to a direct approach -- and then one of the shopkeepers I'd asked to keep an eye out for you alerted me that you were in the Chinese restaurant. I had no idea why I was so driven to be with you. It kept me from leaving the station. Over the years I thought of the encounter less and less, until the memory faded into one of those curious experiences for which I had no real answers. Of course, now, I understand -- it was the bond, and you were probably reaching for me in that indescribable way you always do, and I had no real understanding of it. You couldn't tell me, either. I probably wouldn't have believed you."

"Did you ever get to Malthusia?" she asked.

He snorted. "What you told me stuck with me. I ended up heading for Risa. It was the one place I thought you might be, and I had it in my head that a few weeks might make a difference, and if I could chance across you again.... Quite a pipe dream. But in that time, I thought a lot about what I really wanted to be, and how determined you were to get that for yourself -- I could tell it was killing you to push me away, and it eventually sunk in that I needed to find that sense of purpose for myself. I did do some archaeological work, eventually. Spent some time teaching. Several years later I was offered the _Enterprise_."

Deanna hugged herself and closed her eyes.

"Dee?" His arm went around her, and this time she leaned into him, letting herself be flooded with the warmth and love she had missed so terribly.

"I don't know what might have happened, if I hadn't been there," she said, the tears starting again. "But if I had to be there for you to return to Starfleet, so I can be here now, it was worth the pain."

"Oh, cygne," he sighed. Holding her close, he rubbed her arm, trying to comfort her.

"I missed you, so much. I felt so terrible for turning you away. No matter how much I knew it wasn't -- "

His arms tightened, and she felt his lips on her forehead. Taking her head in his hands, he looked her in the eye. "You did what you had to do. And I'm grateful that you did. You're exhausted, let's go to bed."

He took her robe from her, draped it on the chair with his shirt and jacket, went to his side of the bed to climb in with her. She'd started braiding her hair, and he took over to finish the long plait. "Now I'm just going to wonder what it might have been like."

"I was just thinking that I finally have some closure, because for a long time, I was at a complete loss and trying to understand how I could have hallucinated all of it -- the only Anna Benning I could find, anywhere, was a woman quite a bit older and not at all like you. She hadn't ever traveled off Earth."

"Probably a cousin of my father's." She smiled, even though it hurt a little to hear that he had looked so hard. "I wanted to tell you it would all turn out all right. I wanted to help you understand. I knew it was difficult for you to not have information, not understand what was going on."

"Difficult doesn't describe it. I was... haunted."

Sitting up against the pillows, she watched him tie off the end of the braid, and lean back against his pillow. "I have to say, I got a lot more attention as a blonde."

He scowled at her. "What?"

"The reaction I got was dramatically different. Oh, stop, I'm not going to make it permanent."

"Good." Jean-Luc stopped scowling and turned out the lights. She settled into his arms as he tucked her in against his chest, as usual, his chin in her hair. "You didn't give me much chance to miss you, this time."

"I did enough of that all by myself. You didn't need to suffer, too. I love you, Jean-Luc."

He settled, quieted, but his thoughts were still churning away. She sighed heavily.

"Sorry. I was just trying to remember if you were wearing your ring, when we were in the restaurant. I think I wasn't paying any attention."

"Get angry at yourself for trying to steal your wife tomorrow, silly fish."

"Oh... if you put it that way."

 Deanna waited for a while, until his breathing slowed and she sensed he was on the verge of sleep. "Jean?"

"Hm?"

"Can I have a tour of your starship?"

It took him a few moments to remember the last thing Anna had told him, then his arms closed around her more tightly, and he chuckled. "Yes. Anything else?"

"A happy husband?"

The response from him was immediate -- a buoyant kind of happiness, and his contented sigh heating her scalp. "Easy to please."

"Quite the opposite, but thank you for confirming that I have better judgment than I did."

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Quantum filaments do damage in canon. Ref: episode of TNG - Disaster.  
> The plot bunny's challenge was to find a way to get Troi to reject him. Not an alternate or mirror Picard, the real one.  
> Canon plays fast and loose with the timeline/dates, so I do, too. There was in fact a big gap between the Stargazer and the Enterprise. One that almost begged for messing with....


End file.
